AFTER CHRISTMAS, Missy and I started hanging out a lot more. We’d meet once or twice during the week, usually for coffee or dinner at my place. A church friend of hers threw a New Year’s Eve party and invited me as well, and it was great fun, albeit nonalcoholic and therefore a much more sober event for me than previous years. But it was still enjoyable, and definitely preferable to sitting at home alone.

The new year saw a gradual expansion of my social circle. Missy and I started hosting a biweekly girls’ night at my place; we’d order in pizza and rent movies and sit around talking till the wee hours. I really liked her friends; they were all-around nice people. They all knew each other from church, so that or God in general would occasionally find its way into our conversations, but it wasn’t really that bad. Part of me had been curious about the whole thing ever since that Christmas Eve sermon, but I wasn’t as interested in it as they seemed to be. Even so, we always had a great time.

My New Year’s resolution was to get my California teaching credential, which proved to be no small task and made me wish I’d gone with something easier, like ending world hunger or bringing peace to the Middle East. I did some research and found vague descriptions of the hoops through which I needed to jump, but nothing was clear-cut. For a state that was desperate for teachers, they sure didn’t make it easy. But I knew that my time at Williams & Williams was limited, not because of my performance but because of my interest—or lack thereof. Office work was fine for a while, but hardly my dream job. It seemed a pity to have wasted four years of college on a degree I’d never used, and I really did like teaching. I hoped hard I’d be credentialed in time for the spring hiring fairs.

One Friday in late January the girls arrived as usual. Missy brought the pizza, Joy the drinks, and Taylor the movies, one of which was Evita.

“Oh!” I squealed. “I’ve always wanted to see this! The score is fantastic.”

“You know the Evita stuff?” Missy asked.

“Oh yeah, I saw it in Chicago. I’m a huge musical fan. Les Miz, Phantom, Chess … I did musical theatre in high school too, and I always wanted to do Evita.”

Taylor’s eyes glinted. “I think you need to showcase your talents, Miss Winslowe.”

“Oh no—”

“Oh, come on, sing something, please?” Joy begged.